Ansar al-Sham

Kata'ib Ansar al-Sham was a Syrian Sunni Islamist and Salafi jihadist group which was founded in September 2012 by Abu Omar al-Jamil, a veteran of the Soviet-Afghan War. It brought together conservative Sunni Islamist fighters in northern Latakia Governorate, and it primarily recruited local Syrians (mostly Syrian Arab Army defectors, shopkeepers, and farmers), but it was also open to foreign fighters. The group was funded by Saudi Arabia until 2015, and it had the ultimate goal of establishing an Islamic state in Syria during the Syrian Civil War. It had good ties with the al-Nusra Front and Harakat Sham al-Islam, and, by March 2014, it had 2,500 fighters.